Communiqué original :

KBC leads with Bolero Multi-Banking channel

Since 2005 KBC has been working closely with Bolero and already provides live multi-banking services to a number of its corporate clients. A new agreement signed today between KBC and Bolero further extends this partnership and enables KBC Group to offer to all its global customers multi-bank trade finance services over the Bolero channel.

The Bolero multi-bank service automates the end-to-end lifecycle of the Letter of Credit and Guarantee instruments for both Importers and Exporters removing substantially the costs complexity, discrepancies and time delays associated with the traditional paper based or partially electronic processes. It has been increasingly adopted by corporates and their banks as the standard channel for multi-bank trade finance.

Herwig Huysmans, General Manager, Trade Finance Department at KBC says: “At KBC we have built significant domain expertise in trade and trade finance and we have supported the use of the Bolero multi-bank channel for a number of our key corporate customers. Our understanding of the value provided by multi-banking solutions both to corporate clients as well as to their banking partners has led us to actively support a multi-bank strategy as complimentary to our own successful trade services solutions. It is clear that this has allowed us to develop a closer relationship with these customers. There is no doubt that the market for multi-banking solutions is growing rapidly and our decision to partner with Bolero confirms KBC's commitment to the needs of its customers as well as to the provision of a standardized multi-banking channel”.
By automating the Trade Finance Process including the electronic channel to its multiple banking partners, a corporate can have the benefit of a risk mitigation instrument without the majority of costs and issues traditionally associated with the Letter of Credit. In addition this provides consistency, standardisation and consolidation as well as the ability to electronically collaborate between Corporate and Bank.

“We have had a close relationship with KBC for some while as they have developed their strategy to support the multi-banking requirements of their corporate customers.” said Arthur Vonchek, CEO of Bolero. “By extending our agreement in this way KBC continue to show leadership in trade and trade finance and further signals the convergence by banks and corporates alike on multi-banking standards for trade finance.”

About KBC
KBC is the second largest bancassurer in Belgium. It is the 18th largest bank in Europe and a top financial player in Central and Eastern Europe (on the basis of consolidated assets, branches and employees). KBC's headquarters are located in Brussels (Belgium), the heart of Europe. The KBC group is present in more than 30 countries worldwide, employs 55 000 staff (nearly 30 000 of whom in Central and Eastern Europe) and caters for 12 million customers (some 8 million in Central and Eastern Europe). KBC GROUP NV is listed on NYSE EURONEXT and the Luxembourg Stock Exchange (ticker symbol ‘KBC').
KBC is a multi-channel bancassurer with a geographic focus on Europe, catering mainly for retail and private banking customers and small and medium-sized enterprises. Besides focusing on providing retail and private bancassurance services (via bank branches, insurance agents/brokers and the Internet), KBC is active in asset management and private equity, and in the field of corporate banking, leasing, factoring, re-insurance, insurance, brokerage, project and trade finance in Belgium, Central and Eastern Europe and elsewhere (mainly in Europe).
Moreover, KBC is active in the European debt capital markets, has a solid position in the domestic cash equity markets and is a prominent niche player in a number of global derivatives markets. Over the past decade, KBC has built up a strong presence in many of the countries that joined the EU on 1 May 2004 (Poland, Hungary, the Czech and Slovak Republics). More recently, KBC has made acquisitions in Bulgaria (DZI Insurance, DZI Invest and EIBANK), Romania (KBC Securities Romania, Romstal Leasing and INK Insurance Broker), Russia (Absolut Bank) and Serbia (KBC Banka and Senzal, renamed KBC Securities AD Beograd, Hipobroker, currently KBC Broker, and Bastion, renamed KBC Securities Corporate Finance).
Besides its leading position in the Belgian and Central and Eastern European markets, KBC also has a private banking network in eight Western European countries.
www.kbc.com

About Bolero
Bolero was created as a neutral, trusted third party to develop a comprehensive set of standards that would remove the barriers to global, cross-enterprise business. Bolero implements and enforces these standards in an open platform to enable paperless trading between buyers, sellers, logistics, banks, agencies and regulatory authorities anywhere in the world, delivering transaction visibility, predictability, speed, accuracy and security.
Building on this platform, Bolero delivers applications that enable the merging of the Physical and Financial Supply Chains, allowing companies to fundamentally re-engineer the way that business is done and take advantage of electronic trading. Customers and their trade partners are rapidly deploying Bolero solutions delivering significant reductions in cost and working capital, increased visibility and improvements in operating efficiency.
www.bolero.net